“I now have the results of my y-DNA test what do I do now?”

“I now have the results of my y-DNA test what do I do now?”

As a genealogy researcher who now uses y-DNA results as a integral part of my family research almost ever day. I am now getting this question ask of me “I now have the results of my y-DNA test what do I do now?”

I am going to try to give a very simple explanation of a complex subject by using the example of three different jigsaw puzzle that been mixed together.

Let's say one person like to put together jigsaw puzzles made up of more 1,000 pieces (all the different Parker families) and some how there different boxes are now mixed together into one big bag. The three boxes were still there with the pictures ( y-DNA) on the front of each box (a single Parker DNA Group on each box), One was the scene of the beach ( one Parker DNA Group), the second the picture of mountains (another different Parker DNA Group)and the third a picture of a dairy farm (another different Parker DNA Group).

We know each puzzle has a scene of the sky (common children names) and the grass ( places where they live). So we know there will be some pieces that will fit in all there puzzles. Therefore as we put more pieces of the puzzle together and as we see more of the scene (paper trails) now we discover that one of the pieces that is in the shy scene is not the right shade of blue (wrong child name or that child never married) then we have to take the piece out of that puzzle and now know that it belong to one of the other two puzzles (some other DNA group).

Now lets say that at some point you look and see that some one has put numbers 1,2 and 3 on the back of some of the pieces of the each puzzles so you now know to look at each piece to see if it has a number or not. (information that other researchers have provide from their own paper trails and/or y-DNA test)

At some point you have put together enough of the one of the puzzle to realized just which of the three puzzles you are working on for example the beach scene (someone that has traced their Parker y-DNA line back to the oldest known ancestor by having a good paper trail) then when you pick up a pieces from the mixed up puzzles bag then you now have a better change of knowing that they belong to the beach scene (your DNA Group).

I hope this will help in your research effort. All comments and questions are welcome.